Reforms to the gas pipeline regulation framework commenced in March 2023. Under the reforms, the AER is required to publish a Regulatory determinations and elections guide (the Guide). The AER first published the Guide on 12 September 2023.
The Guide sets out:
- the AER’s powers and functions relating to the determining the level of regulation of gas pipelines (form of regulation determinations), regulation of new pipelines (greenfields determinations), and classification and reclassification of pipelines.
- the process for making applications for form of regulation determinations and greenfields determinations
- how we will assess form of regulation determinations and greenfields determinations and how we will apply the relevant statutory tests
- the process for making pipeline classification and reclassification applications and decisions.
Amendments to the Guide
On 15 March 2024, we published a draft of a revised Guide, which contained a number of minor amendments to the Guide for consultation.
Following stakeholder consultation, we published a revised Guide on 16 May 2024. Further information about the amendments, submissions and revised guide can be found here.
On May 2024, we published our final decision on making minor changes to five AER Guidelines to reflect the addition of the emissions reduction objective to the existing National Energy Objectives (NEO). We have now made these minor changes.